Researchers in New York City are looking to prevent the use of plasma-rich antibodies to the virus without reaching the critical stages of the disease.
Hospitals in New York City, USA are preparing to use the blood of people recovering from the new Coronavirus (Covid-19) as a potential treatment for the disease. This therapeutic approach, which was introduced a century ago, is based on the infusion of patients with the blood of recovered patients with antibodies to the disease. The researchers are pinning their hopes on the success of this approach in helping New York City - which has become a hotbed of the epidemic in the United States of America - to avoid the fate of Italy, which intensive care units were overburdened to the point that doctors were forced to exchange patients who were in urgent need of respirators .

These attempts come after studies conducted in China, during which researchers injected patients with plasma - one of the blood components that contain antibodies, but they are free of red blood cells - taken from people who had recovered from Covid-19 disease, but those studies did not So far, only preliminary results are provided. Although this therapeutic approach, called "plasma-recovered", has had only limited success in responding to previous viral outbreaks, such as SARS and Ebola, American researchers are looking to maximize its benefit by examining the choice of Blood loaded with a high content of antibodies, and give it to patients who are more willing to benefit from it.
It is worth noting that one of the most important advantages of plasma therapy lies in the fact that it is available immediately and at the moment, while the development of medicines and vaccines takes months, or years. In addition, injecting patients with blood in this way appears to be a relatively safe approach, as long as blood samples are subject to testing, to ensure that they are free of viruses and other pathogens.
The researchers calling for the use of plasma to accelerate the application of this therapeutic approach, albeit as a temporary measure, in order to save critical cases on the one hand, and on the other hand ... enabling hospitals to withstand the flood of cases that will overwhelm them. In this regard, Michael Joyner, an anesthesiologist and physiology researcher at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, says: "Every patient we can get away from the intensive care unit is a tremendous logistical victory, given what hospitals are witnessing. From overcrowded patients. "
Researchers hope that this initial offering of treatment will be followed by expansion of its application, to include the groups most at risk of Covid-19 disease, including, for example, nursing staff and doctors. For these people, this treatment can prevent them from getting sick, so that they can stay in the hospital workforce, which cannot work without them.